Automatic site translation: how to do it?

Translating a website allows companies to interact with a wider audience and consequently increase your sales.

The translation of a website is generally carried out by people with the appropriate linguistic skills, in fact the contents of your website will not be translated literally, but also in the most used language from the population in question. However, there are translation plugins that allow you to make a translation automatic website translation through the use of online translation services (e.g. Google Translate), obviously the translation will not always be optimal, but it can be an initial step in creating a multilingual site.

Before dealing with the issue of automatic translation, let's see some fundamental points to follow in order to translate your website in the best possible way.

Define goals

First, it's important to ask yourself what are the goals that prompt you to translate your company's website.

To better define your goal, it is essential to ask yourself questions about why your site needs a translation. Eg, Do you want to expand your market? Do you mainly work abroad? Are you interested in gaining particular notoriety in a specific country? 

If you want to offer a localized experience to customers in a country where you already sell, or if you don't need communicate with multiple foreign countries, translating the website could be the next activity to be implemented.

Difference between Translation and Localization

Secondly, another important aspect to consider before translating your website is to understand the difference between translation and localization.

Translation is rarely done literally because each language has expressions, phrases or puns that are difficult to replicate in the same way in another language; for example, you might find words that mean one thing in one language, but mean something else in another country. Precisely for this reason, when it comes to translating your website, it is more appropriate to talk about website location rather than translation.

In fact, localization is a linguistic operation through which a translated text is made to fit perfectly into the language culture into which you want to translate. Furthermore, it should be specified that in addition to written texts, all media for which translation is required can, and often must, be localized, such as films, documentaries and of course all content distributed via the internet. Website localization, for example, has become essential for all those companies that intend to acquire new customers and compete in the global market.

Write effectively

If you want to increase your clientele, and consequently sell more, it is essential to know write effectively. To translate your website, it is important not to forget the importance of functional copywriting.

This is where the machine translation feature of the website comes into play. You may think: if I automatically translate into contents they will not be effective, since they are not written directly by a copywriter. This is a legitimate doubt, but actually translating website content automatically can help you make content more effective, since you can invest in a copywriter who will only focus on one content review, correcting them from an SEO perspective and based on the culture of the country of the reference language.

Machine translation can therefore be a solution to reduce the translation costs of your website, since you will not have to hire a full-time copywriter, but only for subsequent revisions and refinement of the contents.